IN THE not-so-distant future, civil servants might find themselves in a tight spot after the new bill on conflict of interest is enacted. Even receiving a small gift could be a crime punishable by up to five years in jail.

The bill, which has already passed its first reading of the National Legislative Assembly, would ban civil servants and their immediate family from receiving gifts, benefits or offers, such as a special discount, interest exemption, or remission.

This is regardless of who the partners might be. Even transactions between close friends and family members could land a civil servant a criminal charge.

While the legislation is a response to the country’s paramount need of a corruption-coping mechanism, the question arises as to how the stringent rules will affect the everyday lives of millions of civil servants.

During an opinion-gathering session last week, a man claiming to be a Public Health Ministry employee said that people working for the government were not only public servants, they were people with social and personal lives.

“We all have long-time friends, best friends, who offer us gifts and kindness. Will this law prohibit a representation of love in those friendships?” he said. He pleaded with the legislators to reconsider and not take away the social lives of those serving the public.

However, graftbusters Mana Nimitmongkol and Sangsit Piriyarangsan both view the controversial rules as fair.

Mana said the stricter the regulation, the better. This would make it easier for the public servants to work and live. “When the law is written very clearly, the enforcers can work accordingly. This is unlike the current situation where the law is ambiguous and a vast number of committees have to be set up,” the anti-corruption campaigner said.

“More importantly, when the law isn’t clear, civil servants have to be even more careful.

“Any act could fall into the broad definition of corruption and they could easily be convicted.”

Some people were concerned that the new law could elicit unnecessary complaints, causing trouble for both the enforcers and the defenders. However, Mana said there were existing mechanisms that could deter such foul play.

The corruption court that was recently set up, he said, had all these deterrence mechanisms.

Sangsit, a member of the National Reform Council and one of those propelling the bill, said such rigid rules were common in many countries.

Some of them set an even more pressing bar, banning civil servants from receiving gifts with a value of more than $10 or approximately Bt300, he said. In Thailand, the current cap was Bt3,000.

Both graftbusters said honesty was a fundamental value that every civil servant should hold.

Sangsit said that civil servants were extraordinary as they had the public power and their income came from taxpayers’ money. It would not be appropriate for them to have a conflict of interest, he said.

“This isn’t even a sacrifice; it’s a responsibility,” he said. “You earn money from the taxpayers so you shouldn’t get more than that. If you want more, you can find a better place in the private sector.”

Sangsit said that as an expression of love and loyalty in friendship or any relationship, receiving a small gift worth Bt2,000 was more than enough.

A recently retired civil servant who had served in an executive position, who asked not to be named, told The Nation that it had always been the norm not to accept expensive gifts. The reciprocity culture makes it very easy for civil servants to abuse their power in exchange for those gifts, he said.

However, the veteran public servant said that, in reality, the law might not be as problematic as some people thought. It was difficult to scrutinise everyone and he believed most civil servants would not be troubled by the legislation, he said.

“I think it would be more [difficult] for some very obvious cases. And only |high-profile officials or politicians would be the target. Others will be able to carry on with their normal lives just fine,” the source said.

THE prime minister told children visiting Government House yesterday that Thailand certainly must have democracy but one that is “Thai-style”.

In his speech during an event commemorating Children’s Day, General Prayut Chan-o-cha did not clearly define the term. He simply said that it should be a democracy free from conflicts.

“Our country cannot afford any more conflicts. We certainly must have democracy. But it is Thai-style democracy. We must not break the rules. I ask all Thais to consider this,” he said.

Prayut, who also heads the ruling junta National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO), also said there must be efforts to instil basic democratic principles in younger people to ensure a stable future for the country.

The premier told his visitors that this is a “year of peace and orderliness”, adding that the country had seen increased peace and orderliness in the last 3-4 years.

Prayut also had some advice for parents. He asked them to encourage their children to study in the areas that they like and gain skills.

“We do not want everybody to do the same things. We should encourage children to study with the goals of increased social development and improved national competitiveness,” he said.

Hundreds of minors, accompanied by their parents or guardians, went to Government House and attended activities organised to mark Children’s Day, which is held on the second Saturday of January.

Many of the young visitors went inside the prime minister’s office just to sit on his seat and have their photos taken. Some of the children came from as far as the southern border provinces, and some young visitors represented children with disabilities and special needs.

A six-year-old Muslim girl, from a kindergarten in Nonthaburi, was the first child to be allowed to sit on the PM’s seat.

Only a small number of lucky children visiting Government House were allowed to have their photos taken with the PM. Others had to settle for having their photos taken with cardboard cut-outs of General Prayut in different poses.

The PM also took part in activities organised for the visiting children, including singing and handing out colouring books.

Meanwhile, key Pheu Thai Party figure Khunying Sudarat Keyuraphan has urged politicians from all political parties to jointly show stance against an “outsider” prime minister gaining power after the next general election.

“An outsider PM would ruin the system. Pheu Thai will take a strong stance against an outsider,” Sudarat yesterday told Kom Khao, a website affiliated with the “red-shirt” movement.

Sudarat’s appeal came from her belief that Prayut would become the next government head without running in an election because the current Constitution allows an outsider to become a prime minister.

Under the charter, 250 senators picked by the junta are empowered to vote along with 500 elected members of the House of Representatives in selecting a new prime minister. This means the new prime minister may not come from the party that wins a majority of seats in the Lower House.

Observers believe Prayut may prolong his power after the election by becoming an outsider premier with the support of senators and some politicians for parties connected to the junta. But if politicians joined forces, it would help to prevent the future promulgation of “bizarre” regulations, Sudarat said.

Politicians from two major parties – Pheu Thai and Democrat – have called on Prayut to run in the election. But that option is no longer possible because the charter states that members of National Legislative Assembly, Cabinet or NCPO have to resign from their posts within 90 days after the new charter becomes effective if they wish to contest the next election. The new charter was promulgated in April last year.

Prayut has said the next election would be held in November.

Despite the Constitution Drafting Commission’s strong censure of the bill revised by the NLA, it would not call for a joint vetting committee to be set up to revisit the bill before it came into effect.

A source close to the CDC said that the charter writers made the decision as they thought the NLA must learn to clean up its own mess after having amended the law allowing the current National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) members to maintain their position regardless of their qualifications.

NLA president Pornpetch Wichitcolchai admitted Friday that the CDC had submitted a letter regarding the issue to him, expressing concern that the NACC bill exempting some members from complying with the Constitution might be against the Supreme Law.

Pornpetch said CDC chairman Meechai Ruchupan had recommended that the NLA seek the opinion of the Constitutional Court and that the CDC would refrain from calling for the setting up of a joint law-review committee.

The development came after the NLA had passed the bill governing the NACC late last month. The bill was passed in spite of much controversy, especially about the incumbent commissioners.

Some critics viewed it as discrimination. Members of some independent agencies such as the Election Commission (EC) were dismissed while the nine NACC commissioners could keep their positions. The NACC was already in hot water as the public was keeping an eye on its work over the scandal involving the luxurious timepieces of junta leader General Prawit Wongsuwan.

Some critics said it was not beyond expectation that the NACC would not be dismissed, considering NACC president Pol General Watcharaphol Prasarnratchakit had close connections with Prawit. The graft-buster in 2014 was a deputy secretary-general of the prime minister, de facto serving Prawit who has been a deputy prime minister.

The source close to the CDC also said the charter writers did not want to petition the Constitutional Court because it did not want the Court to be caught in a predicament.

If the Court ruled that maintaining the current NACC members was unconstitutional, it could lead the public to question whether the same standards should be applied to the Court, too, the source said, explaining that earlier the Constitutional Court judges had been spared dismissal.

And even if the Court ruled that the NACC incumbency was constitutional, still questions could arise if the verdict was because the Court was trying to save itself, justifying its questionable incumbency, the source said. The CDC did not want to be the person who did that to the Court, he added.

Aside from that, sparing the NACC could lead to more trouble in the future, he explained. Individuals defending themselves in the NACC could conveniently raise the issue of their constitutionality and reject their conclusions in corruption cases, he added.

They could even take the matter to the Constitutional Court, he said.

This would again place the Court in a dilemma and challenge even the credibility of the Constitutional Court, especially as some critics already considered it to be politically tainted, he said.

However, the source remained uncertain whether the NLA would seek the Court decision over the incumbency of the NACC, although the Assembly had once done it when that of the Ombudsman was involved in a similar debate.

On a conspiracy theory note, he said the petition that time could have been part of the plan all along. The Court ruling that the Ombudsman continuing his term was not unconstitutional could have been planned just to be a basis for other commissioners, including the NACC and the Constitutional Court itself, to follow, he said.

This time, if the NLA was to do it, it must be a genuine act because there were no other possible motives – unlike with the Ombudsman bill, the source said, reiterating he was not sure how they would move.

The letter from Piyarat Chongthep of For Friends Association, which campaigns in support of political prisoners, asked the NACC to probe nine watches seen to be worn by Deputy PM and Defence Minister General Prawit Wongsuwan.

“It shouldn’t be hard for the NACC to probe such expensive watches,” Piyarat told The Nation. “They should be available in only a few shops in Bangkok. I also submitted related documents that should help the NACC locate the watches’ origins in a few days.”

While the NACC has set up a committee with 45 days to investigate the case, Piyarat said he would wait another 30 days for a clear response from the country’s official graft-fighting agency.

The nine watches on Piyarat’s list are on top of the 10 watches that anti-graft activist Veera Somkwamkid detailed in a letter last month to the NACC for investigation.

Piyarat said that Veera would be among activists he would consult if there was a further need to update the NACC.

Piyarat recently created the “Prawit’s watch calendar”, a calendar depicting photos of Prawit wearing 12 different watches, one for each month in 2018. “We gave them away for free and didn’t expect them to be this popular. We’ve almost run out of them now,” he said.

Both Prawit and the NACC have been largely silent on the issue, resulting in speculation about tight connections between them. The NACC president, Pol General Watcharapol Prasarnrajkit, once served as the deputy secretary-general to the PM attached to Prawit.

The NACC has said it would summon four unnamed people from the private sector to provide testimony on Prawit’s watches, but the organisation has yet to elaborate on the process being taken in the case.

Netizens have tracked down photos of Prawit wearing on different occasions different watches from what appears to be an extravagant collection, each worth from the hundreds of thousands to more than one million baht. The scandal arose after Prawit was seen wearing a very expensive Richard Mille watch during the Cabinet photo opt.

Facebook page CSI LA, speculates based on reviewing media photos, that Prawit’s has at least 19 luxury watches in his collection with a total estimated value of over Bt30 million.

Prawit did not declare total assets valued above Bt200,000 upon entering the Cabinet in 2014.

Several activists have filed petitions and called for the NACC to probe to ensure that Prawit is not concealing assets or “unusual wealth”.

Meanwhile, the Criminal Court on Friday rejected a police request to issue an arrest warrant against Ekachai Hongkangwan, another pro-democracy activist who repeatedly attempted to give his own watch to Prawit as a symbolic protest.

Deputy Police Commissioner Pol General Srivara Ransibrahmanakul led a group of officers to make the request on the grounds that Ekachai allegedly broke the Computer Crime bill by, as the police said, posting “obscene information” online.

The Court turned down the request, ruling that a summons should be made in advance to notify Ekachai of such a charge.

Some former MPs went to bless Khunying Sudarat Keyuraphan, one of the party’s active key figures and, one of the leading candidates to be chosen party leader for the next election.

On the same day, former PM Chavalit Yongchaiyudh also declared his support for the party when Pheu Thai politicians paid him a visit.

But when Prayuth Siripanit led the Northeast-based ex-MPs to pledge “life-long loyalty”, the third incarnation of the Thaksin Shinawatra-founded party was assured of the support of Isaan MPs ahead of the election.

Prayuth is a political heavyweight – a veteran politician, a former minister, and a key campaigner behind drafting the notorious blanket amnesty bill that triggered the fall of the Yingluck Shinawatra government.

The amnesty fiasco might erode his credibility but he continues to maintain control over his stronghold and hence was able to lead such a pledge of loyalty. But to what extent will these Isaan MPs stay with the most obstructed party under the junta, which still bans political gatherings and obliges parties to “update” their membership list in a way much seen as a requirement to reset?

Going with a military-leaning end of the spectrum becomes an undeniably good choice for political survival. The Sasomsap clan and the Palangchon group have the potential to detach from the Pheu Thai Party, let alone Bhumjaithai, Chart Thai Pattana and the Machima blocs.

Prayuth may hold a tight grip on the Isaan MPs group, Pheu Thai Party’s strongest area, but the emergence of internal conflicts would likely shake the party’s regional stability.

Many Pheu Thai members, particularly key red-shirt figures, want to replace Prayuth in order to hold power in such an influential region once the election process is underway.

When a party can nominate only one candidate per constituency, local ex-MPs and red shirts would have to compete at their best to gain the seats.

Each side has their own sense of belonging. The red-shirt leaders think that they have done their job in keeping up with the masses against the military coup. The ex-MPs, meanwhile, can still participate in community projects and activities although barred from formal political movements.

This is only the beginning of internal Pheu Thai conflict in its largest stronghold – even when the promised election remains murky to all.

The moves of Prayuth, Sudarat or Chavalit could hint at the party’s path.

Lifelong loyalty, though sweet, is merely another political discourse and marks the beginning of political uncertainty ahead of the election.

The up to 54 political activists including group leader Suthep Thaugsuban, have been charged by the Department of Special Investigation following their role in the 2014 demonstrations against former PM Yingluck Shinawatra and her government.

Sawad Charoenpol, the group’s lawyer, said the accused are ready to meet the prosecutors as appointed, but whether all of them will show up or not he cannot confirm at this point.

Ombudsman secretary-general Rakkecha Saechai said the Ombudsman held a meeting to consider the matter and resolved to dismiss the case.

Rakkecha said Somchai had filed the petition asking that the Ombudsman examine whether Article 70 under the EC law is unconstitutional.

By law, the Ombudsman is one of the agencies able to receive complaints in regard to the constitutionality of issues of concern and decide whether to forward them to the Constitutional Court along with its opinions.

Under Article 70, EC commissioners and its president have to leave office after the new EC law is promulgated. The five EC commissioners including Somchai have now left the office as a result.

Somchai argued that the stipulation may contradict the charter as it requires that members of independent bodies would have to leave office if their qualifications do not meet the requirements as outlined in the charter.

However, Rakkecha cited the previous Constitutional Court’s ruling on the qualifications and terms for the office of the Ombudsmen.

It had ruled, citing Article 273 paragraph 1, that members of independent bodies may stay in office after the new charter is promulgated but once the organic laws are in place, their terms must follow what had been proclaimed in the organic laws.

The Ombudsman viewed that this meant that the charter gives power to the legislative body to determine the terms of the members of independent bodies in various ways, including the total reset the EC faced.

Thus, what was addressed under the EC law’s Article 70 is not unconstitutional, the Ombudsman decided and dismissed Somchai’s petition.

Nattawut said he had no intention to challenge the powers that be, but he only wanted to ensure justice was done after a great number of deaths and injuries.

The red-shirt umbrella United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD) wanted the file to see whether there was any evidence and facts that the NACC had not taken into consideration, Nattawut said.

This was in addition to the Department of Special Investigation (DSI)’s findings that had been used in the court as well as the court’s deliberations into the deaths of 20 red-shirt protesters killed by the officials’ weapons, he explained.

Nattawut said the UDD sought to know whether the latter could be deemed new evidence and thus could be used to fight the case further.

The UDD also wanted the NACC to publish its file to see whether the agency had been straightforward, he said. The group wanted to compare it with how it had dealt with case over the crackdown on yellow-shirt protesters, he said.

The NACC had charged former PM Somchai Wongsawat and other officials in connection with the dispersal of the People’s Alliance for Democracy protesters in 2008.

The red-shirts questioned the impartiality of the NACC after it absolved Abhisit and Suthep in a similar case.

“The NACC’s decision to drop the case over the 2010 violent crackdown is unacceptable,” the red-shirt leader said.

“We want this case, which involves injuries and loss of lives, to go to court. We insist on finding the truth and justice,” Nattawut said. “And if the NACC ignores this and refuses to disclose the file, we will exercise our rights under the information dissemination law.”

The petition was accepted by Chakkrit Tanlert, head of the investigation of political corruption office 1. The official said that the matter would be placed before the commissioners next week.

Pornpetch said the CDC wished to forward the issue to the Constitutional Court for a ruling, but the NACC has not yet submitted its comments on the bill to the NLA. The NLA is choosing to wait for the NACC comments before proceeding.

Under Thailand’s new charter, an organic bill that has been endorsed by the NLA is to be forwarded to concerned parties to consider its constitutionality and provide comments. If differences emerge, a joint law review committee would be set up to consider them before the NLA again votes on the bill. The Constitutional Court could then be petitioned as the last resort.

The NACC’s nine current commissioners were allowed to keep their posts under the new organic bill governing the agency, which was passed by the National Legislative Assembly (NLA) in late December. The bill also extended their terms to nine years.

Criticism has centred on a cause related to qualifying criteria for the NACC, which they say is at odds with a fundamental principle set by the CDC which states that only those qualified by the new Constitution could keep their positions.

The legislators endorsed it nonetheless, with 157 to 26 votes, while 29 others abstained.

The NLA then voted 198 to 1 to pass it after two-and-a-half days of deliberation.